Friday, June 28, 2013

FB06-5: IR and Islam: Muslim Political Thought, International Society, and GCC

Time: Friday, 20/Sep/2013: 11:15am - 1:00pmChair: Maria do Céu de Pinho Ferreira Pinto, University of MinhoDiscussant: Katerina Dalacoura, London School of Economics

Presentations

Islamist Norm Entrepreneurs in International Society: Why, How and When do Religious Norms Diffuse in Liberal International Organizations?

Gregorio Bettiza1, Filippo Dionigi2

1European University Institute (EUI); 2London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE)

Regional integration and crises on the Persian Gulf Sub-region. Casus of Gulf Cooperation Council

Wojciech Jerzy Grabowski

Gdansk University, Poland

The United Nations in Muslim Political Thought and Discourse

Turan Kayaoglu

University of Washington, United States of America

Islamist Norm Entrepreneurs in
International Society: Why, How and When do Religious Norms Diffuse in Liberal
International Organizations?

Gregorio Bettiza is currently
a Max Weber Postdoctoral Fellow at the European University Institute (EUI).
Gregorio holds PhD in International Relations from LSE and his research focuses
on religion and secularism in international relations. And, Filippo Dionigi is
currently Fellow at the London School of Economics (LSE). Filippo holds PhD in
International Relations from LSE and is interested in research on international
norms and Islamist movements especially in the Middle East.

Constructivist scholars have
systematically neglected the mechanisms of diffusion of religiously based
non-Western norms in liberal settings. In recent decades the Organization of
Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has become an increasingly influential international
actor through which Muslim-majority states channel their normative concerns in
international society. In particular the OIC has become actively engaged in
promoting international norms that challenge, often from an Islamic
perspective, hegemonic secular liberal values embedded within the institutions
of international society. The paper focuses on two norms that the OIC has
attempted to promote within the United Nations (UN) since the 1990s. The first
are “dialogue of civilizations” norms. These were successfully
institutionalized in 2005, after gathering substantial backing from Western
states, with a major UN initiative, the United Nations Alliance of
Civilizations. The second are “religious defamation” norms. These,
instead, were relentlessly opposed by Western states and led only to a minor
and vague initiative largely outside the UN’s purview in 2011, the Istanbul
Process. What explains these diverging results? The paper contends that
religiously based non-Western norms have the greatest chances of being fully
institutionalized within the UN, an international organization deeply embedded
in and constitutive of the liberal international order, only when they can be
effectively “translated” into secular liberal norms

Regional Integration and
Crises on the Persian Gulf Sub-region. Casus of Gulf Cooperation Council

Dr. Wojciech Jerzy Grabowski,
Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor in the Political Science Institute (Asian
and African States section) at Gdansk University. He is the author of the
monograph “Muslim fundamentalism in the Middle East” and of many articles on
various subject matters in the international relations field, especially
regional, Middle Eastern order, role of Islam and fundamentalism in politics,
influence of terrorism on the states functioning. He was involved in EU grants
dedicated to these issues and NATO workshops dedicated perseverance of
terrorism: focus on leaders. Currently, he is involved in exploring
regionalization processes in the Persian Gulf sub-region. He is a member of the
Polish Association of International Studies and European Institute of Security.

The Gulf Cooperation Council
(GCC) helps to constitute boundaries of inclusion and exclusion that strengthen
six states in the region, characterized by revisionist powers. By participants
of the GCC it is viewed as an institution leading sub-region to the broader
Arab unity. During the Gulf War 1990/91 participating states were not willing
to resolve common, sub-regional problem, but they were looking for the help
from non-Arab states. Processes of the regionalization help to generalize
conditions or people within sub-regional boundaries speaking about Gulf
policies, business, identity opposed to Arab spheres of activities. The GCC
poses a forum of exchange of political views. But the GCC stands in front of
challenges of the inclusion non-dynastic Yemen and post-Saddam Iraq which would
have significant consequences for the security and economic fields of the
sub-region. One of the problem of the organization is unfulfilled promises
which damage credibility of the organization. This may poses real threat to the
objectives of the GCC. The basic question I will try to find an answer to is:
does the GCC guarantee security to its members in the broad sense or does the
GCC member-states have to seek the security through bilateral agreements with
external powers?

This paper analyzes four views on
Muslim engagement in the United Nations: rejectionist, realist,
Islamic-conservatives, and liberal. The rejectionist views the Muslim
engagement with the UN as harmful to the Muslim cause because the UN rests on
values such as state sovereignty, secularism, and cooperation incompatible with
Islamic political values such as the umma, shari’ah, and dar-ul Islam versus
dar-ul Harb. The realist also rejects the Muslim engagement with the UN not because
of its incompatibility with Islamic values but because of the imbalance of
power within the UN between the great powers and Muslim-majority states.
Specifically, the American influence over the UN combined with the deep
resentment of American politics towards the Muslim world prompts this group to
be very cynical about the UN. The Islamic-conservative views the UN as a forum
which can be utilized to demonstrate and defend the truth of Islam and to
protect and promote Muslim interest by influencing its normative and political
structure. The liberal perspective views the UN useful not just for serving to
Muslim interests but for the common good of broader international community.